German MotoGP, Sachsenring – Qualifying Results

Brad Binder and Marc Marquez are rewarded for risking slicks by leading a damp Qualifying 1 at the Sachsenring and will now join the top ten riders on Friday in the Q2 pole position shootout.

Despite large parts of the track being dry, nobody dared to try slicks until Binder with five minutes to go.

Moments later 11-time winner Marquez, using one Honda chassis and one Kalex chassis this morning, fell (on wets) with the HRC frame at the final corner. The Spaniard leapt to his feet and ran back to the pits before his bike had even stopped moving, returning, on the Kalex chassis, with slicks to snatch second.

Binder and Marquez were the only riders to fit sicks – KTM revealing team-mate Jack Miller had convinced Binder to go for dry tyres, the South African giving a thumbs up to the Australian as he returned to the garage.

The pair could now benefit from their extra knowledge of the tricky track conditions in Qualifying 2…

* Rookie

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Germany was the nadir of Francesco Bagnaia’s 2022 world championship season, slipping 91 points from Fabio Quartararo after an early fall before fighting back to take the title in the second half of the year. Bagnaia returns with a 21-point lead over Marco Bezzecchi.

Sachsenring is Marc Marquez’s most successful circuit, with eleven wins at the German Grand Prix, including eight in the MotoGP class. Absent last season due to arm surgery, when Quartararo took victory, Marquez hasn’t been beaten at the tight and twisty anti-clockwise circuit since 2009 in 125cc.

Marquez is riding alone at Repsol Honda with team-mate Joan Mir sidelined by a hand injury at Mugello last weekend. LCR Honda’s Alex Rins is also absent after fracturing his right tibia and fibula in Italy. The COTA winner won’t be fit to return until after the summer break. Rins’ team-mate Takaaki Nakagami has been handed a Kalex chassis for the first time this weekend.

GASGAS Tech3’s Pol Espargaro has abandoned a planned return in Germany and is again replaced by KTM test rider Jonas Folger, meaning a home rider will be taking part in the premier class. Espargaro is also thought unlikely to be fit for next weekend’s Assen round.

Older brother Aleix, diagnosed with two broken bones in his right heel after struggling with bicycle injuries throughout the Mugello weekend, limped away from a at turn one after just ten minutes.